


The Magic Paradigm

by Whedonista93



Category: The Big Bang Theory (TV), The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Crack, Crack Crossover, Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-04-17
Packaged: 2019-04-24 01:43:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14345325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whedonista93/pseuds/Whedonista93
Summary: "Did I just lock a monster in Sheldon's bathroom? He's gonna be pissed if he has to clean up after a monster.""No, the monster is in some ancient dungeon.""I was kidding about the monster.""I wasn't."





	The Magic Paradigm

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, aggiepuff for being a wonderful sounding board (as always) when my crazy ass went, "Hey, what if Penny was a Baird?"

“Are you sure it’s okay for us to crash with you? We can really get a hotel,” Eve attempts to let Penny off the hook for the tenth time as they follow her up the stairs.

 

Penny waves her off. “No way. I haven’t seen you in forever. Between my place and the boys’ place, we can totally find space for everyone.”

 

“And you’re _sure_ your friends won’t mind?”

 

Penny laughs. “Sheldon minds _everything_ , but I’ll talk him into it. Leonard will be cool with whatever.”

 

* * *

 

 _Knock knock knock_ . “Penny.” _Knock knock knock._ “Penny.”

 

Eve reaches for the door, but Penny stops her with a hand on her arm. “Let him finish,” she whispers.

 

 _Knock knock knock_. “Penny.”

 

Penny reaches for the doorknob with a bright smile. “What’s up, Moonpie?”

 

“It’s Thai night. Do you want your usu- oh,” Sheldon glances around Penny’s living room, “you have company.”

 

“Yeah, this is my cousin and some of her coworkers. They’re staying with me for a couple nights.”

 

Sheldon grimaces. “They’re _all_ staying _here_?”

 

Penny quirks an eyebrow. “Is there a problem with that?”

 

“There most certainly is! There’s hardly adequate space.”

 

Penny shrugs. “We’ll make do.” She can practically see the wheels turning in his head as his eyes flick from her couch to her cluttered floor to her room and back to the four extra people in her living room. He heaves a sigh and Penny bites her tongue to keep her triumphant smirk under wraps.

 

“Space can be made in our apartment. You can call the supper order in, as you have the extra mouths,” Sheldon decides as he spins on his heel and walks back across the hall.

 

“Thank you, sweetie!” Penny calls as she closes the door and lets her smirk emerge.

 

Eve mock bows. “That was masterful.”

 

Penny shrugs and winks. “Baird women know how to get what they want.”

 

Eve smiles broadly. “Damn straight.”

 

* * *

 

“I am Dr. Sheldon Cooper and I believe I was remiss in meeting standard social obligation earlier as far as introductory constructs.”

 

Eve blinks at the brunette in front of her.

 

Penny rolls her eyes. “That’s Sheldonese for ‘who the hell are you?’”

 

Eve nods slowly before she offers a hand. “Colonel Eve Baird.”

 

Sheldon eyes her hand distrustfully.

 

Penny smacks his arm lightly. “Non-optional. You can wash your hands after.”

 

Sheldon gingerly shakes her hand.

 

Penny snags his elbow before he can move toward the sink. “Three more, Moonpie.”

 

Sheldon shoots her a brief glare. “Do I have to shake all their hands?”

 

“Yes, Sheldon. You’re gonna wash your hands, anyway. So you might as well go all out,” Penny holds a hand up to cut him off when he opens his mouth, “and I do not want a lecture about communicating germs.”

 

“It’s communicable,” Sheldon mutters.

 

Penny glares.

 

He heaves a sigh. “Very well.”

 

“Ezekiel Jones, mate.”

 

“Oh, Australian! What is your opinion of Lawrence Bragg’s contributions to X-Ray diffraction?”

 

Ezekiel quirks an eyebrow. “Huh?”

 

Sheldon huffs in disappointment and moves on.

 

“Jacob Stone.”

 

“Hmm, midwestern. Likely blue collar… oil, maybe? Oklahoma?”

 

Jake chuckles. “Nice goin’, Sherlock.”

 

“Cassandra Cillian.” The redhead is looking over his shoulder instead of meeting his eyes. “I, uh, I don’t mean to be rude, but that equation is wrong.”

 

“I beg your pardon!” Sheldon drops her hand and spins toward his whiteboard. “It most certainly is not!”

 

“No, but it is!” Cassie insists as she approaches the board. “This part right here… _a/e_   should be _e/n/a_.”

 

“Impossible!” Sheldon exclaims.

 

“Oh my gosh… this is great. Penny, do you have popcorn?” Leonard grins broadly at the display.

 

“Sheldon hid some above the fridge,” Penny waves vaguely as she watches Sheldon’s face twitch and steals his spot on the couch.

 

“Your friend is going to lose this argument,” Eve advises.

 

Penny’s eyes bounce back and forth between the two. “I really hope so.”

 

“He will,” Jake assures, “Cas is a synthesise. She sees the world in numbers. And she’s _never_ wrong.”

 

Leonard comes back with popcorn and drops onto the couch next to Penny. “This is fantastic. So what do you guys do?”

 

“We’re Librarians,” Jake answers absently.

 

Penny quirks an eyebrow at Eve. “What does that make you, Colonel?”

 

Eve shrugs. “Their Guardian. You’d be amazed how much trouble the smartest people in the world manage to get into.”

 

“First of all, why do I feel like those words mean something different than the common understanding of them? And second, I’d probably be less surprised than you think,” Penny responds with a fond glance at her resident geniuses.

 

Eve smiles back and ignores the first question when she answers. “Yeah, I’m kinda getting that.”

 

Sheldon makes an unusual sputtering sound and his face turns an interesting shade of red.

 

Penny turns her attention back to the pair at the whiteboard. “Okay, I have never seen that particular shade of red on his face. What the hell did you just say to him?”

 

Cassandra shrugs. “He realized I was right.”

 

* * *

 

“Close the door!” Eve calls as she literally dives out of Sheldon and Leonard’s glowing bathroom door and into the hallway, right on the heels of her Librarians.

 

Penny slams the door shut on reflex mere seconds before something bangs against it hard enough to shake the walls. “What the hell, Eve? Did I just lock a monster in Sheldon’s bathroom? He’s gonna flip shit if he has to clean up after a monster.”

 

“No,” Eve pushes herself up into a sitting position, “you can open the door back up. Monster got locked in some ancient dungeon. Jenkins will send us to pick it up as soon as we figure out another way to contain it.”

 

“ _Riiight_ ,” Penny drawls, “I was kidding about the monster.”

 

Eve laughs. “I wish I was.”

 

Penny stares at her cousin long enough to determine she is not, in fact, shoveling her a load of bullshit, then shrugs and offers her a hand up. “We will have a _very_ long conversation about this later on when I can get _very_ drunk.”

 

Eve accepts the offered hand. “Deal.”

 

“That’s utterly preposterous,” Sheldon scoffs from the end of the hall, “there is no such thing as monsters.”

 

“Four people, who left through the front door three hours ago, just dove through your _glowing_ bathroom door and into your hallway, Sheldon. You were sitting in the living room the whole time. They didn’t come back through the front door. The fire escape does not lead into the bathroom. How else do you explain it?” Penny crosses her arms and waits for an answer.

 

“There has to be a logical explanation,” he insists.

 

“There is,” Cassie smiles. “Magic.”

 

Penny rolls her eyes. “Mr. Beautiful Mind here is gonna need proof. Trust me.”

 

“Oh!” Cassie exclaims and digs a handful of stones out of her pockets. “I borrowed these from the Library when we thought we were dealing with something more corporeal. They form a magical barrier -  a cage of sorts.”

 

“Okay, we’ll talk about using Library artifacts on missions later,” Eve warns, “but for now, show Mr. Beautiful Mind the magic so I can go get a drink.”

 

Cassandra hands the stones to Sheldon. “Lay them on the floor.”

 

“May I examine them first?” Sheldon requests.

 

“Twenty minutes,” Cassie allows, holding up a hand to cut off his protest. "That is more than adequate time to confirm that there is no technology of any kind in these stones.”

 

Sheldon sighs. “Very well, I’ll go along with your ruse for now.” He uses every spare second of his allowed twenty minutes under Cassie’s watchful eye before giving in.  “Any particular pattern?”

 

Cassie shakes her head. “No. Circle, square, triangle. Just lay them out in any shape that creates a boundary and stand in the middle of them.”

 

Sheldon, predictably, retrieves a ruler from his desk and places the four stones at exact measurements in a square. “Now what?”

 

Cassie shrugs. “Step out.”

 

Sheldon does and raises an unimpressed brow at her.

 

“ _Surge sursus. Praeterea terminos laqueum foedere_.” Cassie waves a hand over the stones, causing them to glow briefly. “Now step back in.”

 

Sheldon obeys.

 

“Step back out.”

 

Sheldon’s foot meets and invisible barrier and he stumbles backward, prevented from falling completely when his shoulder collides with another barrier. He shakes his head. “There’s an explanation for this.”

 

Cassie nods. “There is. Magic. Admit it and I’ll let you go.”

 

Sheldon shakes his head harder. “I’ll figure it out.”

 

Penny cocks her head to the side, a mischievous glint in her eyes. “He really can’t get out of there?”

 

Cassie shakes her head. “Not unless I let him.”

 

Penny happily plops her ass right into Sheldon’s spot, gleefully ignoring his indignant protests.

 

Three hours later, when Leonard walks through the door, Sheldon is still standing in the midst of the invisible barrier, glaring down at the stones. Penny has her bare feet tucked under her knees and is settled comfortably in Sheldon’s spot as Jake and Eve bicker over something on the television and Ezekiel putters around the kitchen. Cassandra is sitting at Sheldon’s desk with her back to the computer and a smirk on her face.

 

“Uh, Penny?” Leonard queries.

 

Penny glances at Leonard, over to Sheldon, and back to Leonard before she shrugs. “Cassie is just proving a point. Don't worry.”

 

“How long has he been standing there? He's sweating.”

 

“Three hours, four minutes, and thirty six seconds,” Cassie practically sings.

 

“What point are you proving?”

 

“That magic is real.”

 

“Oh. Yeah. Good luck with that,” Leonard scoffs, “I've been trying to lay the groundwork for years.”

 

Eve turns on him with an incredulous expression.

 

He shrugs sheepishly. “My paternal grandfather is fae.”

 

Penny throws a pillow at him. “Why didn't you ever tell me?”

 

Leonard straightens his glasses. “Oh, I don't know, maybe because to most people that sounds crazy?!”

 

Penny shrugs. “Point.”

 

“How come you didn't say anything last night when we said we were Librarians?” Jake asks. “If you're part fae, you had to know what that meant.”

 

Leonard shuffles his feet. “Some former Librarians had a pretty bleak view of anything magic related.”

 

“And again, the man has a point,” Eve mock toasts with her coffee cup.

 

“Leonard,” Sheldon whines, “surely you aren't going along with this farce.”

 

Leonard tiredly scrubs a hand down his face. “It’s not a farce, Sheldon, and there aren't words to explain how thrilled I am that I'm not the one having to prove it to you.”

 

“Leonard-”

 

“ _Premo_ ,” Cassie cuts him off.

 

The boundaries shift and tighten around him.

 

Sheldon exclaims in surprise. He lasts another twenty minutes before he hangs his head in defeat. “Very well. I relent.”

 

“Say it,” Cassie demands.

 

“Must I?”

 

“Just say it, Moonpie,” Penny calls from the couch.

 

Sheldon speaks through clenched teeth. “By all presented evidence, I acquiesce that there is a probability that there may be things which science cannot fully explain.”

 

Cassie rolls her eyes.

 

Penny laughs. “Not what she meant. Three words, sweetie, that's all the girl wants to hear.”

 

Sheldon grits his teeth. “Magic. Is. Real.”

 

Cassie beams. “ _Eximo_.”

 

Sheldon stumbles out of his prison and lands clumsily on his knees. He stares at the rocks and then at Cassie. Finally,  he turns to Penny with a trembling voice, “Magic is real,” and promptly passes out.

 

Leonard groans. “Can someone help me move him to his bed?”

 

Ezekiel shrugs. “Just leave him on the floor.”

 

Penny sighs as she stands to help Leonard. “Can't. It's part of our friendship agreements.”

 

“Friendship agreements?” Eve inquires.

  
Leonard shakes his head with a grin that's somewhere between fond and exasperated. “Sheldon has contracts for _everything_. He could give a fae a run for its money.”

**Author's Note:**

> Surge sursus. Praeterea terminos laqueum foedere. - Rise up. Trap and bind that which passes your borders.
> 
> Premo - accentuate; emphasize; put pressure on
> 
> Eximo - remove; release


End file.
